Started reading Atlas a couple of months ago and put it aside after a third or so. I am used to reading “conventionally boring” stuff but this was such a slog. Super sterile, the characters are stereotypical, the message Rand wants to bring across seems awfully clear very early on. It may be the historical context that makes it more interesting, I didn’t see it, though. Just couldn’t do it.
Reading your comments on this thread is a relief, maybe there is nothing wrong with me after all.
Just wait till you get to the last third, where the ideas that weren’t subtly telegraphed in the first two thirds will be even less subtly shouted in a hundred page long speach.
I was lucky enough to read it young before I knew it was “a thing”.
I loved the stream punky Sci fi stuff (yes I loved bioschock when it came out).
I enjoyed the rugged individualism stuff, but like, in the same way I enjoy James Bond committing extra judicial killings, Indiana Jones, cheesy ghost movies , or Hell in a Cell.
I was really confused when I found out it’s got a cult. I just enjoyed my nifty train story.
The writing is dry, voluminous but not really good. I personally enjoyed getting lost in that much volume, but that’s not going to be everyone. The philosophy stuff isn’t bad or wrong within it’s own universe, it’s just not really applicable to real life. Basing a world view on it is like reading/watching the silo series and thinking that’s how you should live in present day, rules about going outside and all. The conclusion isn’t totally wrong, but the premise its valid under is so narrow it’s useless, and that’s how it got it’s cult.
Started reading Atlas a couple of months ago and put it aside after a third or so. I am used to reading “conventionally boring” stuff but this was such a slog. Super sterile, the characters are stereotypical, the message Rand wants to bring across seems awfully clear very early on. It may be the historical context that makes it more interesting, I didn’t see it, though. Just couldn’t do it.
Reading your comments on this thread is a relief, maybe there is nothing wrong with me after all.
Just wait till you get to the last third, where the ideas that weren’t subtly telegraphed in the first two thirds will be even less subtly shouted in a hundred page long speach.
I was lucky enough to read it young before I knew it was “a thing”.
I loved the stream punky Sci fi stuff (yes I loved bioschock when it came out).
I enjoyed the rugged individualism stuff, but like, in the same way I enjoy James Bond committing extra judicial killings, Indiana Jones, cheesy ghost movies , or Hell in a Cell.
I was really confused when I found out it’s got a cult. I just enjoyed my nifty train story.
The writing is dry, voluminous but not really good. I personally enjoyed getting lost in that much volume, but that’s not going to be everyone. The philosophy stuff isn’t bad or wrong within it’s own universe, it’s just not really applicable to real life. Basing a world view on it is like reading/watching the silo series and thinking that’s how you should live in present day, rules about going outside and all. The conclusion isn’t totally wrong, but the premise its valid under is so narrow it’s useless, and that’s how it got it’s cult.